New Blog!!!

Because I have gotten married and Ash said we probably shouldn't share a blog anymore (haha really it might confuse people) so Garret and I have started our own blog. It is garretandkarli.blogspot.com

I'll be working to update it here in the next couple of weeks because I'm really really behind!!!

~Karli

I SAID YES!

Yep! He got down on one knee and I said Yes! Sunday was our 5 month anniversary so he told me he was taking me to dinner on Monday. He took me up the canyon to Sundance and told me that he was we were going to eat in the cabin that his parents are renting because they are here for Spring Break. Well we went up there and he had it all decked out. There were rose petals and candles leading up to the pathway and it was the cutest cottage ever! He had ordered take out from Macaroni grill since that was our second date and had the inside all decorate and there was a fire and everything it was perfect! We ate and then we went for a walk outside. There was a little bridge and then we went back inside and he read me a poem that he had written. I had a thought that he might propose but he had told me the day before that the ring would be at least another week maybe three and he got a text from his sister saying that she knew he was doing a special dinner for me(that was planned) so I thought there was no way. Then we left and came back to Provo and went to the park where we first held hands and where he told me he wanted to marry me and we walked around and then we went to the monument in the middle of the park and as we were walking around it I saw rose petals but I didn't think they were for us and then I saw candles and flowers and realized. We are getting married June 1 in the Manti temple! So this was so fun! When I went to school the next day and told my cooperating teacher she was convinced that we had to tell the kids in a fun creative way so she made me this "veil". Their question of the day was, "Why is Miss Eppich wearing that?" with the choices 1. Crazy Hat Day, 2. To teach us about "ar" (because the blend of the week was ar, and there was a star on the crown) or 3. Because she is getting married. Only two kids thought it was because I was getting married. They were so cute about it! They thought that my name would change to Mrs. Eppich instead of Miss Eppich. They were curious if I was getting married that night and if I would still be their teacher. They have been full of questions!

New Year's Resolution-Blog More

Oh hey everyone, I honestly haven't posted this year and it's March 2010! Picture time! These may not be in chronological order, but oh well!

Halloween-my roommates and I were muses!

For Halloween with my high school friends, we dressed up as Harry Potter
characters. Possibly one of my favorite costumes ever!

Here we are at Chuck E Cheeses, way fun!
(paid ad for Purell)

Here is my roommate Kelsey. She's super mature. In fact, she
just got her mission call to Temple Square!

Micah Adams, what a sweetheart! She's my newest roommate
and we all love her to bits

Puzzle night! Yeah I think this was a Friday night...

Micah, Kelsey, Acacia, Karli, Me
Acacia's Farewell

Oh Disco Night, what a delight!

So there's a few updates from life the past few months in pictures. But there is so much more!!!
Two months ago I started my student teaching experience. I am honestly loving it thus far!

I have the great experience of teaching English 10, Reading 10, and Algebra to Resource students. Some days it is really difficult and I get stressed out, but it's such a great learning experience and I've grown so much for the short time I've been there. My mentor teacher is awesome and we learn a lot from each other! Anyway, that's been my life basically.

So what do I do for my free time? Well, the other week my ward had an activity at seven peaks ice arena playing broomball ice hockey. So much fun! I get super intense while playing, but I really enjoy it despite the crashes and resulting bruises. I didn't think to take a picture, of course, but here's an example.


This looked like my ward, except 20 more people per rink and no helmets or padding. We looked like a bunch of die-hards. Alright so that's just some updates, I'll post later about future things I'm looking forward to.

~Ash

Life...

I have this ever constant battle between sleep and lesson plans. Weird as it sounds, usually lesson plans win over because I have discovered if I don't add every trick I know to them and make them so interesting that no one would dare misbehave (like that ever works!) It is near disaster! Discipline is hard enough, but with a boring lesson . . . DEATH! I have been working more on discipline though. I told Garret today at lunch that I felt like I was becoming a mean teacher. I'm becoming the one who makes them go back to their seats twice because they won't stop talking, and the one who makes them wait two minutes (seems like an eternity!) because they were being so loud before lunch. But amazingly my lessons went better and I felt less stressed at the end of the day. Imagine that! And I think they still like me! They still give me hugs and talk to me at recess.

So for my favorite moment of the day. Today some boys came and sat by me at recess. They said, "We are bored. So we are going to sit here and wait for the girls to come and chase us. Then we run to the top of the pizza slide. They can't catch us up there." I was amazed. First Grade! They already like girls?! They said, "O ya, some boys even have girlfriends!" Scary!!!

IN OTHER NEWS.... Here is what has been going on in life. Our roommate Acacia left to go on a mission to Russia. We had a girls night. Full of typical dinner, pedicures, and junk food. She did an awesome job with her farewell talk and it is so much fun to read her emails from the MTC. And it was also exciting because our other roommate Kelsey got her mission call to Salt Lake Temple Square. We're all really excited for her!

VALENTINES DAY: For Valentines Day, Garret took me on a day adventure. First he let me "Choose my adventure" He gave me some 3 choices and I chose to go to Park City. We went to the Olympic Park and had fun looking displays from the Olympics, sitting in the Bobsled and Luge, and playing some of the games. Then we walked down mainstreet. It was beautiful up there! Then that night he took me on a scavenger hunt, of all the places we have been since we have met.

MESA

What do four stressed out college students do with a long weekend?

Fly to MESA of course!

On the Friday before Martin Luther King Day, Garret's dad flew his sister and her boyfriend and Garret and I down to Mesa for the long weekend. So we hopped on the plane after Emily's wedding (pictures below) on Saturday. It was a fun getaway for a few days.

Sorry if it seems like I post about my adventures in teaching a lot, but I promised some people that as I wouldn't be seeing them much during student teaching that I would post about what was going on. So here is the current. As of this week I am starting to once again realize why I decided to go into teaching! Each day the stress level goes down and the love of teaching goes up as I get more comfortable with what I am doing. I am still amazed with the amount of time that it takes to prep a lesson and the amount of energy that one day takes. I am getting more sleep than I have during my 4 years of college and I am so much more exhausted, but I LOVE it!!!

I have been amazed at how RIGHT a lesson can go in one day and how WRONG that very same lesson can go. I have been amazed because I have one student who really struggles with math and the past couple of days he has been working on the projects and doing them right. A couple of days ago when I asked a question he raised his hand first with the answer and had it right! I was so excited. But then within the same lesson when the students were doing group work, I had just moved from one group to help another and I turn back around to see a girl bawling because she said that her head hurt. My cooperating teacher took her to the office. I have no idea what happened that fast. Two minutes later a boy came up to me with a bloody nose. As I was helping him, a girl came up to me and told me that her group's pan balance had fallen apart, then another girl came up to me and said that her group just was not working together they were all fighting and were not getting a long. Everything had fallen apart in 2 short minutes. How does that happen? :) But it turned out to be a great day and don't worry I still love teaching! :)

Day 3 student teaching:

up since 5:45
want to do NOTHING but sleep
still have to change tomorrow's math lesson before sleeping

seems weird . . . but excited for tomorrow's adventures!

Gift to Jesus

Kids definitely give us insight!

When I was babysitting Cassy's kids the other night, I asked Ian to go pick up his clothes and put them in the hamper. He came into the kitchen with his clothes and Coy's clothes. He said that he was serving Coy because his gift to Jesus for Christmas was service.

We can definitely learn from the example of kids!

The Latest and Greatest

So I know I've been really bad at this blogging thing (and all of my posts start this way) so I'm going to give a quick recap with some of the biggest things... and pretty much the things that I have pictures of, because let's face it that's what you are all going to look at anyway :)

#1 Thanksgiving was great! I spent it with the Harward side of the family at Aunt Diana's. Then the day after Thanksgiving I had the monumental experience of flying on a plane by myself to go to Garret's house in Mesa! I had told myself that flying by myself was going to be a lot worse than it was. Garret took my luggage with him when he drove down three days earlier so that I wouldn't have to check any luggage, and my parents helped me check in and told me exactly where to go. It wasn't a bad experience at all. When I very first got to Mesa, we headed out to shoot guns. It was really fun and I was even actually able to hit the target a couple of times. I also got to see the lights at the Mesa temple and go on a tour of Mesa.

#2 Ash and I were both excited to finish our Fall semesters so we went out to Panda Express to celebrate just as we have every semester since our Freshman year of college. We even let others come with us this time :)

This past Monday I had my first day of STUDENT TEACHING! It's weird that this huge thing that I've been looking forward to for 2 years is finally here. I am with the same class that I was with for Fall Field Experience--25 wonderful 1st graders. I definitely have my work cut out for me :) Everyday is definitely tiring, but exciting. Today I got to help them make rockets out of 3-d shapes during math. It was so fun to see them so excited! Then they begged me to play red-rover with them during recess. I felt like a kid again! It was so much fun.

Jacquel asked me to post the funny things that happen and that they say during these 10 weeks that I am doing student teaching since I won't be at work to tell her. The only one that I can think of right now happened yesterday. After saying the pledge, I heard one boy say to another, "I just don't get why we say the flag is invisible." The other boy just shrugged his shoulders and said, "Me either. It's weird!" They definitely keep me laughing!